Maxima Library

‘Morse had solved so many mysteries in his life. Was he now, he wondered, beginning to glimpse the solution to the greatest mystery of them all...?’

Why does a theft at Christmas lead Chief Inspector Morse to look upon the Festive Season with uncharacteristic goodwill? How can the discovery of a short story written by a beautiful Oxford graduate lead Morse to her murderer? And what happens when Morse himself falls victim to a brilliantly executed crime?

Published together for the first time are ten dazzling short stories by Colin Dexter, including two new mysteries written especially for this anthology. The collection features five ingenious cases for Inspector Morse and five other stories which take us from a cell in Oxford Prison to Sherlock Holmes’ drawing room at 221B Baker Street... and on to a chance encounter with another famous detective in the canteen at Kidlington Police HQ... The final story opens as Morse awaits the arrival of his sergeant in Room 231 of the Randolph Hotel, where once again he must confront a sudden, terrible death.

Tantalizingly plotted and tautly told, each story in this volume is a mini-masterpiece of detective fiction: beguiling, surprising, and totally absorbing.

Thirty-five short stories from the top names in British crime fiction, by the likes of Lee Child, Ian Rankin, Alexander McCall Smith, Jake Arnott, Val McDermid, and more.

The newly appointed member of the Oxford Examinations Syndicate was deaf, provincial and gifted. Now he is dead. . And his murder, in his north Oxford home, proves to be the start of a formidably labyrinthine case for Chief Inspector Morse, as he tries to track down the killer through the insular and bitchy world of the Oxford Colleges. .